I normally adore Sophie Kinsella's books. I've been reading her books since the first Shopaholic book was released and they are such a comfort read for me. I usually love her characters and the dialog between the protagonist and her love interest. That being said this book is just...weird? It doesn't really feel like a Kinsella book to me. The zip her dialog normally has just wasn't there for me, and I felt like there were a lot of questions that never get resolved (why is this famous hotel in such disarray?!).

Thank you NetGalley for the ARC of this book.

Sasha has been having a rough time at work. She is overwhelmed and overworked after having to carry an extra workload as they are short staffed. Sasha is suffering from burnout with her Dr ordering her to take some time off, Sasha decides to take a vacation at Rilston Bay, a beach resort she often visited as a child. While here Sasha works on self-health and learns to unwind and what she wants out of life.

Sasha and her stay at the Rilson was a lot of fun, while there she found herself getting into amusing situations. While her intention in the beginning was to work on a wellness program, Sasha soon finds other ways to help find her own ways towards mental wellness. I enjoyed her interactions with the hotel staff and all their quirks. While the Rilston is not quite how Sasha remembers, she has a lot of fond memories of the place and soon gets wrapped up in the nostalgia.

During her stay Sasha meets Finn, who also visited the resort as a child. Finn too is suffering from burnout. Initially, Sasha and Finn want nothing to do with one another and both seem annoyed by each other's presence. They try to keep their distance from one another, at one point even fighting over who has the rightful claim to sitting on a large rock at the beach. But as time passes Sasha and Finn soon find themselves reminiscing about their fond memories of coming to the resort as children. Sasha and Finn want to recapture some of those memories and start to relive some of those moments together.

One of the parts I really enjoyed were the scenes with Terry, a former surfing instructor at the resort. Sasha and Finn both have fond memories of taking lessons with him. While Terry is now older, frailer, and dealing with memory issues, it was nice to see how alive he comes when he gives more surfing lessons. It was sweet to see how much of a beloved teacher he was.

I've enjoyed many books by Kinsella and was looking forward to her latest release, which did not disappoint. This was a fun, cute, quick read filled with the usual antics you can expect from Kinsella.

Sophie Kinsella delivers another fun, romantic romp! As always, her protagonist is falling in love, discovering herself and figuring out what she wants her life to look like. Colourful characters, witty writing and relatable escapades make her latest novel a compelling read!

I adored this book! I always love escaping into a Sophie Kinsella, but this one really hit home for me as I am going through similar things to the main characters who are so likeable. The entire cast are written so well and I would love to see this book be turned into a movie.

I am sure we have all reached that point at work where you want to run away from all the emails, annnoying, sometimes incompetent colleagues and stress and just never look back. This is what makes this book and Sasha the main character very relatable. Her initial attempts at relaxing and wellness were funny but her journey to finally letting go and being a better her was good. The Hilston and its staff made laugh out loud at various points. Herbert, Cassidy, Simon and Nikolai were a colourful cast of wackiness that made the whole experience more enjoyable. Then there was Finn! Prickly start between them but I liked the gradual thawing and relationship that developed between these two burnout individuals. The book had romance, humour, nostalgia and little bit of a mystery which made it an enjoyable read. 3.5 ⭐️

"The ride is it" according to surf instructor Terry, and I must say I thoroughly enjoyed the ride as a read "The Burnout" by Sophie Kinsella. The novel follows Sasha, a young marketing executive as she deals with burnout from her demanding job (and rejection from her local convent---heehee). Sasha returns to her familiar vacation spot from her youth and ends up spending time with handsome fellow burnout Finn. Overall, this novel had all the components of a feel good rom com. Kinsella has done it again!

Thank you to Random House Publishing and Net Galley for the ARC! Ugh, this one was a disappointment for me. This story follows Sasha and her journey as she embarks on a “wellness retreat” after being burnout from work stress. The book is faced paced and light hearted, but didn’t have the typical Kinsella humour that I was hoping for!

The Burnout is the book to read now. Now, as in, before you go to work to answer more emails than there are hours in a day. Before you have one more day of being overworked and under appreciated. Before, like FMC Sasha, you're ready to give it all up and pledge yourself to the life of a nun to avoid one more manifest positivity wellness survey from HR.

There is so much contemporary familiarity in Sasha's life, but there's also campy comedy & a cozy mystery to solve. The secondary characters that run the hotel feel straight out of a Monty Python sketch. These hotel scenes are timed out like the dinner party scene in You Can't Take It With You. The audience thinks everyone is ridiculous (and they are) but things like tastes-like-swamp kale smoothies, an overly effusive apologetic manager, and a receptionist with a custom embroidered thong side gig is all just another day for the hotel crew.

Our couple also has a lovely bit of action to adventure into while they rekindle their calm (and maybe fall in love too). Mysterious messages are written in the sand out front of their beach lodges. Reminiscing on their childhood spent at the same resort they now are riding out their respective burnout episodes leads them to clues, old friends, and new discoveries about themselves.

The whole book is a ride. And the ride is it. The Burnout will be a very poignant read for anyone stuck, under appreciated, overwhelmed in work or life. This is a hopeful story though, and not just depression porn. Its relatable, hilarious, and would make a well timed read for when the winter blues set it.

Thank you NetGalley and Random House Publishing Group & The Dial Press for an advanced copy in exchange for my honest review.

Truly a super sweet and funny story of two burned out workaholics who independently decide to revisit a childhood holiday beach when they each are forced to take a time-out from work. Twenty years ago, teenage Sasha and Finn used to come to Rilston Bay during the summer with their families to collect memories of swimming, ice cream, surf lessons and just being carefree kids. However, the hotel and beach lodges are now dilapidated, the town shops are mostly closed for the season (it’s February), and there’s only a minuscule staff where they are staying. Both of them are initially so tense and stressed that they scowl at each other on the beach and make rude comments in the dining room. They do realize they have a shared love of surfing and memories of the old guy who taught both of them. And suddenly someone is leaving champagne and flowers with a message in the sand “for the couple on the beach.” Is it mistakenly meant for them?

This is a wonderful story of two very nice people who have been turned into exhausted monsters by their work and find the perfect place to remember the joy of the past and try to find new joy in the present. The old hotel has a quirky group of staff people and you root for them as well. I absolutely loved it! Sophie Kinsella knows to tug at your heart and deliver a wonderful romance. 5 stars!

Literary Pet Peeve Checklist:
Green Eyes (only 2% of the real world, yet it seems like 90% of all fictional females): NO Sasha has pale blue eyes and no one has green eyes.
Horticultural Faux Pas (plants out of season or growing zones, like daffodils in autumn or bougainvillea in Alaska): NO It’s winter on an English beach, and very hard to source organic kale at that time.

Thank you to Dial Press/Random House Publishing and NetGalley for a free advanced reader copy in exchange for an honest review!

THE BURNOUT starts out as an overplayed one-note idea and then morphs into a great book. Unfortunately, it takes awhile to get to the good stuff. Author Sophie Kinsella is very good at mining the Zeitgeist and she hits the nail on the head with awful workplaces and the strange bosses and their acolytes who reside there. When too many co-workers start quitting, too much work ends up on our heroine’s overworked shoulders and she loses herself as she attempts to solve her work/life problems. Unfortunately, the scenes pile up and the details blur as the burnout begins to move from the character to the reader. I almost gave up on the book. But then, the story gets much better. I was fully engaged and could not stop reading. I received my copy from the publisher through NetGalley.

So good! This is my first Sophie Kinsella novel, and really liked it! I think it’s pretty relevant to those of us who can get stuck in the “burnout” cycle. Sasha and Finn are great characters and play well off each other in their various iterations. The secondary characters at the resort are a mix of eccentricities and add in the humour. I have a desire to now visit the British seaside in winter!

There was a bit of a drawn out period where not nothing happened, but a lot of things culminated quickly and kind of out of nowhere. It was a bit discombobulating but not enough to really take away from the story and it wrapped up nicely!

Why is this book so relatable? Why do I know exactly what the main character is feeling when she describes where she is at mentally and emotionally at the beginning of this book?

This story is adorable in true Kinsella fashion. When we meet our main character she is totally stressed out from being over worker and stretched too thin at work. Too the point she is too physically and emotionally exhausted to keep up any sort of personal life. After a (hilarious) mental break she is forced to take a breather and goes on a vacation. Which of course leads to a small beach town with a cast of hilariously quirky side characters running a run down hotel, a broody fellow guest and all the kale smoothies a girl could eat. This book is fun and definitely worth the read.

A sweet escape from our fast-paced lives, Sophie Kinsella's The Burnout is the book that will soothe your flustered nerves.

Sophie Kinsella does it again.
I side with Sasha so much about work burning you out it was like reading parts of my own life (although I have never tried to join a convent and got turned away...)

This was such a fun read. Part of it might be that the timing of reading this while experiencing my own burnout part of it is just that Sophie writes awesome books but this was exactly what I need to keep me going!

I recently hopped on the Sophie Kinsella bandwagon and am a fan! I love the light & witty banter between the characters and the fact that her books are laugh out loud funny!
The Burnout was so so good! I loved the setting & the grump vs sunshine romance. Such a cute read. I flew through it. Thank you to NetGalley & Random House Publishing- The Dial Press for an ARC in exchange for my honest review. 4.5 stars

I’ve been over chick-lit (or rom-com, as I’ve heard it called lately) for years, but I always make an exception for Kinsella. Every time she writes a new book, I snap it up, telling myself, “You’re not going to like it; you don’t like these anymore...”. But I always DO like them and I certainly liked this one just as much as I’ve liked everything else she’s ever written. Kinsella’s a master of the genre.

God knows I've been praying for a quality rom com, and Sophie Kinsella delivered. Little did I know her new room com would also contain a mini cold case mystery!

The Burnout is a fun, hilarious read, with a realistic relationship between the two main characters and incredibly relatable stress-related life issues.

Lastly, I love this book and it's not just because my name is in it!

Thank you so much for the advanced digital review copy!

Always love Sophie Kinsella's books and "The Burnout" did not disappoint. A great book about the desire to run away when life gets to be too much, and what and who you might find on that escape.

I loved this book. Sophie Kinsella is one of my favorite authors and this book did not disappoint. I was waiting for her newest and this was perfect. Burnout is real and something we all suffer from. This book helped me to deal with my own burnout. I cannot wait for Sophe's next book. I laughed. Reading this was great therapy for me.

The Burnout follows our main character, Sasha, as she becomes strung out and overworked, and finally it all comes to a head and she goes on a spontaneous holiday to the beach she grew up vacationing at. The premise of this book was charming and relatable, and it was easy to read and for the most part enjoyable. However, the main character and the love interest had almost no chemistry, mostly because the love interest felt like he had no personality, and he was just kind of there. His whole background was glossed over, and the misunderstanding that inevitably drove them apart was resolved in a single sentence without really getting into details. I also feel like it tried to capture too much at once - the surfing, the accident on the beach years ago, Sasha's wellness, the romance, the hotel's future, the art. I couldn't keep track of the story at some points, and I think it would have been more enjoyable if it had a little less going on. I really did enjoy Sasha's story of recovering from burnout and discovering herself again, though! Much more than I enjoyed the romance (which I think was definitely more of a subplot anyway). I'm also almost never a fan of a time jump, which happens at the end of this book. This book was easy to read and I really liked the main character, but ultimately I think it tried to tackle too much.